The Saddest Part of Derrick Rose's Story

At this point, it's hard to remember Derrick Rose. We all know the long absences, the never-ending road back to MVP form, and the sadness we feel whenever he goes down again. We pay close attention to Rose, we monitor his progress, we value him immensely. But it's been so long, we may not even know what we're waiting on. He's become like one of these people who is famous for the sake of being famous.

Luckily, there is YouTube, the collective memory of the NBA that's always there to efface the present. On there, Derrick Rose is alive and well. The tentative, blunt guard we saw this year in Chicago is nowhere in sight. Instead, there's a fearless depth charge of a player, driving at the basket with a combination of speed and strength rivaled only by LeBron. Anyone in his way, he found a way to get around them without interruption. If that didn't work, he went right through them.

Then there was the body control. Body control is one of most elusive qualities in basketball—to some degree, everyone capable of throwing down an alley-oop or elevating out of traffic has to have it. But Rose was one of those players who seemed as comfortable in mid-air as on the ground. He wasn't suddenly operating in zero gravity free-fall, trying to pull something off before time ran out. Rose's acrobatic finishes were extensions of his drives. The way he contorted his body to get just the right angle was precise and relad at the same time. Derrick Rose was born to fly.

And on top of that, he could finish like no one's business. If Rose got past a certain point, the ball was going in the basket. He laid the ball up with authority; he dunked as rabid punctuation. If Rose often played the game like a dynamic running back, that last crucial move was somewhere between a dive into the end-zone and a celebration punishable by death. Except in Rose's case, there was nothing arrogant about it. He did it because it made sense. If anyone could be workmanlike about high-flying guard play, it was the stoic, no-nonsense Rose. Rose resonated with Chicago because, for all his virtuosity, it was just another way to get the job done.

That's what makes his injury woes so poignant. Rose isn't a player who flew too close to the sun or demanded more of the world than it was willing to give him. Nor is there any personality trait (or flaw) that marks him as a tragic figure. Derrick Rose is a guy who just wanted to show up and play. And over and over again, that's been taken away from him—and us. Of course, this isn't about us. This may be it for a once-brilliant athlete who also seems like a very decent person. But Rose undoubtedly made the sport better. He leaves a void where a superstar used to be. We may not quite recall what we're missing, but we feel the empty space.

There's a theory that because of his style of play, Rose was doomed from the beginning. The kind of force he erted on his body was unnatural for someone his size; his constant forays into the paint would take their toll. Dwyane Wade was often held up as an example of a player who expanded his game for these very reasons. But Rose was a very different player from Wade. Wade is a multi-dimensional guard who early on, relied on a specific part of his game. Rose was built to do one thing well. He was destined to play basketball—landing in his hometown is proof positive there—and at the same time, seemingly fated to end up this way. Rose did what he was supposed to do, played the game the only way he knew how, and paid the price for it. It's cruel but the logic there is also ineluctable. Derrick Rose's body broke down because he was Derrick Rose.

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Except there's one glaring flaw with the argument, attractive (and even comforting) as it may be: the existence of Russell Westbrook. The Thunder guard is just as athletic as Rose ever was but plays recklessly, in an excited state that practically dares something to go wrong. Except while Rose was ruined by doing things that were beyond what any body should be able to bear, Westbrook gets better and better the more he pushes the boundaries of what's possible. Compared to Westbrook, Rose was methodical. Rose was just too responsible for us to view him as meteoric, or a daredevil who lived on the edge. Westbrook is all those things and he just might be the 2015 MVP.

That's what makes Rose's story so sad and so hard to accept: There's no story there. It's just senseless. We can't find the narrative to describe why this would happen or, regardless of what happens next, how we should think about Rose's career. All we have is that sense of loss. And at this point we've mourned him so much, it's like he disappeared a long time ago. If anything, seeing him play this year was like watching a ghost or subjecting ourselves to bittersweet nostalgia.

Whenever I write about Rose, I have to admit that I once wrote a hit-piece about him on this very site. Actually, hit-piece isn't exactly right. I just said that I didn't care for his style of play, even if the results were undeniable. In retrospect, I took Derrick Rose for granted. He was so steady, so rock-solid that it never seemed like he would fall apart like this. His play, however striking, was also rooted and durable.

It simply never occurred to me that Rose might not be around much longer and if it had, I would've dropped my act much sooner. My feelings about Rose were probably the opposite of general consensus. But we all felt like Rose was an important part of the NBA landscape. Derrick Rose was here to stay. He was an institution. At this point, Rose has become little more than a haunting refrain. That, at least, will be with us for a long, long time.

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